News Satire Roundup: March 27th

Sunday, March 27

·        Recap of the Week – Ketanji Brown Jackson’s confirmation hearing, William & Kate’s royal tour to the Caribbean

o   Excellent description of Judge Jackson’s fortitude in the face of absurd, inflammatory questions during her confirmation hearing – “Just focus on how exquisite that pause was. In it was contained the strength and patience of every Black woman being stretched to its absolute limit. In that pause was the divine calculus where she had to balance ‘How much do I want this job?’ and ‘How much do I want to cuss out these preposterous people?’”

o   I loved this reaction to Ted Cruz immediately checking his Twitter mentions after his question at Judge Jackson’s hearing – “Can you imagine being Ted Cruz and wanting to hear what people think about you, on the internet? That is a doom scroll that will not end well.”

o   I laughed out loud as John’s response to William and Kate’s Caribbean visit as a “charm offensive” – “Well, it’s certainly one of those things.”

o   This was good bit – “They posed next to a Bob Marley statue while somehow managing to look more lifeless than an actual statue.”

o   John loved Jamaica’s prime minister kicking off a photo op with William and Kate by telling them how much Jamaica looks forward to moving forward as “an independent, developed, prosperous country” – “Oh, shit! He basically broke up with them before they sat down. They didn’t even make it to the chairs!”

·        And Now This – Inside Edition previews

o   This is always a good And Now This – My favorite “coming up” teasers were “Baby dinosaur mystery!” and “Chiropractors for babies!”

·        Main Story – Drug harm reduction

o   John had top-notch shade for a dorky old anti-drug PSA – “Everybody knows the hottest spot to snort coke is a bench on a residential street in broad daylight.”

o   Great reaction to the news that overdose deaths in the U.S. were double the number of gun deaths in a one-year period – “Quick side note here: it is depressingly-American to be shocked that something could cause more deaths than guns. We are the only country that would look at that and say, ‘It’s hard to believe that drug overdoses are killing more people than one of those natural causes of death: highly-preventable loss of life through loosely-regulated weapons.’”

o   While John didn’t skimp on the dangers of Fentanyl, he did point out that the notion of it being so potent that police officers can OD simply by touching it is completely false – According to scientists, “‘You would have to be in some sort of wind tunnel with massive amounts of fentanyl’ to accidentally OD.”

o   Instead, John explained, any adverse reactions cops have to Fentanyl is more likely panic attacks, specifically because of the myth that it can be deadly to simply be near it. He nicely summed up the danger of a myth like that – “When you treat a drug like a bioweapon, you justify a punitive, militarized response to it.”

o   As a result of the fearmongering over drugs like Fentanyl, it can be remarkably difficult for users to access harm reduction tools that could save their lives – In many states, possessing Fentanyl testing strips can get someone arrested for “drug paraphernalia,” and the prescription-only status of anti-overdose drugs like Naloxone is a steep barrier for outreach groups to purchase the medication in bulk to distribute to users.

o   We also looked at overdose prevention centers a.k.a. “safe injection sites” – It was exceedingly telling to hear one user, a veteran, in a news clip say, “I’ve gotten more help here [at the overdose prevention center] than I’ve gotten from the V.A.”

o   John pushed back against people who insist that overdose prevention centers will encourage non-users to try illegal drugs – “They’re not for the heroin-curious to sample flights of syringes like IPAs. They’re to help people who already use drugs do so in a way that won’t fucking kill them!”

o   Very succinctly put – “The problem facing all harm reduction policies is that people are so angry with people who use drugs, they want to try to punish them into abstinence, but that is not how any of this works.”

o   One harm-reduction advocate described the effects of current U.S. drug policy very bluntly – “When people have nothing left, they will use until they die.”

·        And Now This – More Inside Edition previews

o   Still fun! – I especially liked, “Peacock invasion!”, “You’ve been replaced… by a robot waitress!”, and, “The woman they’re calling ‘Hula Hoop Karen’!”

·        Finally – Nenana Ice Classic

o   John was absolutely thrilled to hear about Nenana, Alaska’s, annual betting pool over when the ice on a river will melt enough that a tripod sitting on top of it will fall through.

o   I enjoyed John’s delight at the town’s incredibly-complicated system to monitor precisely when the tripod falls through the ice – “Excellent. They basically built a Rube Goldberg machine out of random items to call this contest.”

o   Relatable – “Don’t you envy that woman? Don’t you envy how much unbridled joy she felt watching a giant wooden tripod float by a partially frozen river? She’s got life figured out! We’re over here running around like idiots, being miserable all the time about everything, while she’s up in Alaska watching ice melt and experiencing a level of pure happiness that the rest of us will never feel in our pathetic lives. That woman is living her best life and we are all dipshits.”